Cycling festival gets wheels turning on safety

A fire truck’s blind spot presents a serious danger for cyclists. At the Kingston Cycling Festival, participants can sit in the front seat to judge it for themselves.

The event, which takes place at the Rogers K-Rock Centre on Sunday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., marks the third year the festival has been held in Kingston. It’ll include a stationary fire truck provided by Kingston Fire and Rescue as a demonstration of the vehicle’s blind spot.

The event will also include booths for participating organizations, a cycling skills circuit on the K-Rock Centre’s ice pad, a BMX track in the parking lot and an on-road training area on The Tragically Hip Way.

Cycle Kingston is co-ordinating the event along with the K-Rock Centre and numerous attending organizations, including CyclePath, Yellow Bike Action, Cataraqui Trail, the City of Kingston, Think First and KBMX. The festival will be free for participants and attending organizations.

This year’s festival will see more organizations at the event. A Yellow Bike stand will be inspecting bicycles for safety features, while Think First, a bike safety organization, will check helmets for fit. Kingston Gets Active will also have a children’s obstacle course near the south door entrance of the K-Rock Centre.

Paul Rappell said Cycle Kingston aims to broaden the event this year to attract adults along with parents and children. For that reason, it’s no longer called the "Family Cycling Festival," he said.

"It’s not just recreational — it’s transportational," he said. "The skills we teach are applicable to everyone."

For example, cyclists will practise riding around open car doors, glancing behind a bike while riding in a straight line and entering roadways from a driveway at the event.

Each of those situations present potential dangers, but few cyclists receive training beyond the lessons they received as a child, Rappell added.

Last year, Kingston saw an expansion of bike lane infrastructure to improve cycling safety. Brock and Johnson streets received new bike lanes between Sir John A. Macdonald Boulevard and Division Street last July. The city has also announced plans to install bike lanes on Princess Street, Division Street and Montreal Street in 2015.

According to Cycle Kingston president Neal Scott, Cycle Kingston advised the city on some of the cycling lane installations by Brock and Johnson sreets, along with the installation of new "sharrow" signs along the LaSalle Causeway. Sharrow signs guide cyclists in a lane and remind drivers to share the road.

While the new infrastructure has improved safety, Scott said education is key and there’s still a long way to go. Part of it is teaching cyclists to be more assertive when dealing with motor vehicles, he said.

"One of the issues with cycling lanes is that cyclists assume that they will be safe," he said. But there are obstacles and parked cars to avoid, and when bikes have to make left turns, they must leave the cycling lane to do so, he said.

Proper safety training helps cyclists act more like vehicles in those situations, which makes them more predictable and visible for cars, Scott added.

The city has a variety of groups working to improve bike infrastructure and safety. Scott said he’d like to see the city co-ordinate the efforts of those disparate groups through an advisory group or similar body.

Education, together with infrastructure improvements, such as bicycle parking and cycling lanes, can create a culture of cycling, he added.

"There’s no silver bullet that will suddenly make half the population switch," he said. "It takes time. We’ve all gotten very used to driving around in cars."